Being an advocate for women is not enough, if you also support Israel

In an “intersectionality” powerplay meant to further ostracise Jews from the progressive movement, Palestinian advocates boycotted last weekend’s Women’s March Los Angeles over the inclusion of Jewish actress Scarlett Johansson as a featured speaker.

Intersectionality is a dogma increasingly popular in left-wing circles that asserts that various forms of oppression — such as racism, sexism, classism, ableism and homophobia — are interconnected, and that anyone who proposes to oppose one form of oppression while supporting another is not welcome to take part in the struggle against any oppression. Since anti-Semites consider Zionism a form of racist oppression, by their terms anyone who is not opposed to Zionism cannot join the struggle for women.

The Palestinian American Women’s Association and several other pro-Palestinian groups — including Jewish Voice for Peace — boycotted the march held on Saturday, one of dozens that took place across the United States to fight for women’s rights and progressive causes.

PAWA said Johansson’s “unapologetic support of illegal settlements in the West Bank” sent “a clear message that Palestinian voices and human rights for Palestinians do not matter.”

Johansson was a spokeswoman for SodaStream when its main plant was in Judea. The plant has since moved to the Negev and now employs 1,400 people, one-third of them Bedouin Arabs. More than 70 of the West Bank Palestinians who worked for the company when it was located in Maale Adumim work at the new plant.

Johansson resigned as a goodwill ambassador for Oxfam because the United Kingdom-based organization supported a a boycott of Israeli communities in Judea and Samaria, such as the one in which SodaStream was located.

She collaborated with other women in Hollywood to establish the Time’s Up initiative to protect women from harassment and discrimination.